SYDNEY, Australia - Australian voters face a stark choice on Iraq when they choose a new prime minister - to stay or to go.

Prime Minister John Howard, whose conservative coalition is seeking a fourth three-year term on Oct. 9, sent 2,000 troops to join the U.S.-led invasion last year and still has 900 military personnel stationed in and around Iraq. He is committed to keeping them there until they are no longer needed.

He is the first leader from the three major nations whose troops were part of the invasion to face an election. President Bush follows a month later and Britain's Tony Blair is expected go to the polls in spring next year.

His opponent, labor leader Mark Latham, is a critic of the invasion and says he will bring home most Australian troops by Christmas if he wins.

Canberra's commitment to the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq and its ongoing troop deployment in the violence-plagued nation has not been the biggest campaign battlegrounds - those would be health and education, as well as the economy. But it is the one that most clearly divides the candidates.

In a speech Wednesday, Latham repeated his pledge to withdraw troops and accused Howard of supporting a U.S. foreign policy "mistake" by sending troops there in the first place.

Howard hit back on Thursday by saying a pullout now would be a victory for terrorism.

"It will be a terrible defeat for the West (if) everybody cut and ran," he told Sky News.

"It would be a huge victory for the terrorists in Iraq, if we were to cut and run, if the Americans were to cut and run, if the British were to cut and run," he added. "It's difficult, it's nasty, you're dealing with inhuman, brutal people whose lack of moral code is beyond our comprehension."

Howard has condemned other coalition members - Spain, Honduras and the Dominican Republic - for deciding to pull their soldiers out of Iraq.

Terrorist bombings in Madrid that killed 191 people preceded Spain's March elections by three days, and the country responded by unseating Prime Minister Jose Maria Aznar. Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero fulfilled his campaign promise to bring Spain's troops back.

The Australian opponents have spent most time on the campaign trail outlining their vision for improving this nation of 20 million's health and education systems, but Iraq and the threat of terrorism has cast a shadow over all their speeches.

Just days after Howard announced the election date, suicide bombers killed nine Indonesians in a huge blast outside Australia's embassy in Jakarta. Days later a group in Iraq claimed to have kidnapped two Australian workers - a claim that was never documented, but which underscored the dangers in Iraq.

Howard's decision to join the Iraq invasion triggered huge peace protests in major cities across Australia last year - the largest such demonstrations since Canberra sent troops to support U.S. military action in Vietnam.

But not a single Australian soldier has been killed serving in Iraq and protest has now largely dried up.

Latham says that if Australian forces are to fight terror, they should do so closer to home.

"I say the real job for Australia (in fighting terrorism) is in our region, working with our neighbors and with the United States in our part of the world," Latham said in his campaign speech Wednesday, in a reference to the terror threat in Southeast Asia.

Latham's speech came as an AP/Ipsos Poll revealed Wednesday that 66 percent of Australians believe the threat of world terrorism has been increased by the Iraq war.

Howard initially said destroying Saddam Hussein's weapons of mass destruction was one of the key reasons for joining the invasion. After international teams failed to find any such weapon, Howard said the invasion was a success because it toppled one of the world's most brutal dictators.

All polls show Labor and Howard's conservative coalition government running virtually even ahead of the elections. Those who said Australia's support for the war was a mistake narrowly outnumbered those who endorsed it, 48 percent to 45 percent, The Associated Press-commissioned poll found. It had a margin of error of three percentage points.

AP-ES-09-30-04 0159EDT